No Future

Spectator

By Stephen Tuttle | Feb. 6, 2021

If she's the future of the Republican Party, the party is in deep trouble.

By now, you've likely heard of Marjorie Taylor Greene, the new congresswoman from Georgia. Her connection to reality or, for that matter, sanity, is limited.

Taylor Greene has an interesting habit of saying or posting outlandish conspiracy theories and offering “likes” to even more offensive posts, only to walk them back once they've been exposed. She was a firm believer in the QAnon idiocy until she claimed she wasn't, though she continues to reference “the plan.”

(Just so you understand, the QAnon “plan” calls for the military to arrest many left-leaning Democrats and celebrities who will be exposed for their participation in an international cannibalistic pedophile ring. It was supposed to happen during the Trump presidency since, according to Qanon believers, he was “anointed” for the task. When it didn't happen, the military was supposed to step in before Joe Biden was inaugurated and ship the miscreants off to Guantanamo Bay to be tried and executed. Or, in another version, just rounded up and executed. Nothing happened because none of it was true.)

But belief in QAnon, past or current, isn't the worst Taylor Greene's ideas.

In November 2018, with wildfires burning out of control and dozens dead in California, Taylor Greene speculated that perhaps the fires were being intentionally caused by a satellite or satellites concentrating the sun's rays and beaming them earthward. Perhaps, she posited, that would help the solar energy industry. Not quite done, she added the old anti-Semitic trope that all of this was financed by the Rothschilds. 

She's not averse to violence, either. 

In April 2018, referencing the deal with Iran signed by Obama, one of her online pals said, “Now do we get to hang them? Meaning H&O?” (Hillary and Obama.) Greene's response? “Stage is being set. Players are being put in place. We must be patient. This must be done perfectly or liberal judges would let them off.”

In 2019, while discussing Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Greene said, “She's a traitor to our country, she's guilty of treason ... a crime punishable by death is what treason is. Nancy Pelosi is guilty of treason.”  

In January of that year, she agreed with a Twitter post that “a bullet to the head would be quicker” as a way to replace Pelosi. In fact, she's liked several social media posts referencing the murdering of Pelosi.

But she hasn't restricted her blood lust to just Pelosi or politicians. Taylor Greene has also liked Facebook posts saying FBI agents involved in the Trump/Russia investigation or FBI leaders who insufficiently supported Trump should be shot or hanged. Those civil servants and Trump appointees are apparently all part of the “deep state” conspiracy.  

In fact, Taylor Greene has rarely seen a conspiracy theory she didn't like. 

She first claimed the murderous rampage that killed 17 students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, was a hoax. Then she said it was clearly a “false flag” operation designed to strip away Second Amendment rights. (A false flag operation is one in which an act is committed by one party to place blame and responsibility on a different party.)   

She even called David Hogg, a survivor of the Parkland massacre, a “crisis actor,” and there is a widely viewed video of her chasing him down a sidewalk while harassing him about gun rights. She also claimed, multiple times, that the shooting in Las Vegas that killed 58 people “obviously” involved more than one shooter. 

The problem with Taylor Greene's various musings and her admiration for the even loonier musings of others, aside from their violent undertone, is there isn't even a nanogram of truth to any of it. Not surprisingly, her current obsession is the entire Biden-stole-the-election foolishness, which contains as much truth as the rest of her daffy conspiracy theories. 

Taylor Greene would be little more than an oddball annoyance in normal political times. But she has a soapbox and followers; none other than Donald Trump has called her “the future of the party.”

The Republican Party had a certain stability of message for some time before 2016. Controlled by conservatives, they believed in smaller government, lower taxes, a strong national defense, a semi-isolationist foreign policy, and even a balanced budget. It was a solid platform, an honest and honorable political philosophy on which to run, even if the goals were never achieved.

But what is the Republican platform now? If Taylor Greene is the future, is it conspiracies everywhere and death to anyone who disagrees? More blathering about “deep state” fantasies? Has the GOP leadership become so incredibly impotent they're willing to substitute nihilism for conservatism?  

If Taylor Greene is their future, the Republicans have none.